Holy crap-You MUST see this! (academy strat)

[asandir]

Good luck with it Myst, I applaud your dedication with this

[okrane]

I already did 18th level in week 5 with dungeon... see the other thread for a screenshot...
My progress was:
week 1: level 8
week 2: level 10
week 3: level 15
week 4: level 17
week 5: level 18

So it is doable, I proved it. Even if not with Academy. I will try Academy too...

[asandir]

level 18 dungeon in week 5? Now that would be interesting against the wizard! thou if memory serves, your forces were a bit low .... was that correct?

[Pitsu]

On a map like Mystics Vale a lvl9 warlock on first week with minimal losses etc is pretty easy. No Man's Land with significantly harder mine guards is another matter though. Couldn't do well enough there...

[okrane]

Ok. Here are more details about what I had.

Artifacts:


Army and stats:



The major spells and their damage(note that it is Week of Magic so cost is halp of their real one):




And the skills and abilities:


So this is it. Did not find the slippers, and Meteor Shower. But Ice is also a dangerous tool.
As mistakes: I lost about 8 furies throughout the game for not being attentive, and about 10 Hydras:5 fighting some matriarchs which I engaged with little mana, and another 5 when fighting an enemy hero with a rather small army(5 raksassas were the strongest) because of his magic mirror ability.
And of course other mistakes involving planning, creeping and building that were suboptimal.
I found it is very useful to sacrifce 20 minotaurs or so, to increase the growth of furies by 2. In any case, minotaurs serve only as a meatshield, furies as killers, Assasins I save, Hydras are cannon fodders for heavy ranged attackers.

ok.... this about covers it...
tell me your opinions...

EDIT: problems with pictures... made them appear corectly

[azzy]

Okrane, can you be more specific on when did you get MG lvl5 and what dwellings you didn't build or build very late (Dragons are obvious, but I see only 9 riders and you don't mention them at all...)

Also i doubt that this army can stand against strong might Heaven hero in the 6th week, even with the massive spell damage. Quick leveling is great, but on what cost?!? With Acad you still get eithet Raksashas or Titans at that time and with dark elves this is problematic... I have to try it with dungeon to see how it feels.

[okrane]

Raiders I built very late, like week 4. MG lvl 5 was at about week 4 too, but my fireball(leant at a site) and ice ring later on were strong enough to kill any creep on the map so I did not feel the need for a stronger spell

Against haven... all that's possible... Master of ice could be a pain for those archers, but if the hero gets Magical Imunity it won't kill that much of them.

the build was(dont remember exactly):
week 1: furies and scouts, MG lvl1
week2: minotaurs, hydras, 2000 gp
week3: hydra upgrade,then I lost a few days to get 4000gp, matriarchs, some MG, citadel
week4: MG lvl5, raiders, castle.
week5: mosly saved the cash

As I said, this can be improved.

[Alamar]

I think I must simply be confused about the entire strategy. See questions below.

What's the big deal about hitting level 18 after about 4-5 weeks of play on heroic? I'm not a good player and I average L15-L17 after that time frame. Am I missing something?????? I would expect a good player to be able to hit the sorts of levels that we're looking at without TOOOO much trouble. Even if they don't hit L18 a well constructed L16 or L17 hero is still going to be very formidable.

Also in a lot of the builds that I'm seeing there aren't many skills going into perks -- however I see people taking Light and/or Dark magic in the build. This means that you really need to get a good selection of L4 & L5 spells otherwise those skill points are wasted. Are L1 & 2 destructive spells, Summonning and MotW the main spells until you can figure out which other schools you should take?

In the build what spell skills are often taken early and what level is the mage guild in town when you take those skills?

How many artifacts [for creatures] get built and when?

Does the strategy rely upon V2.0 or can you do everything just as well in V1.4?

[Campaigner]

Motw is half action, and with sorcery you act pretty fast, so it is possible. I just am not skilled enough to pull it off is all. Well back to the mines .

Nice that that info about MotW is documented....so MotW + Expert Sorcery gives you 0.80 initiative so it's only 0.20 left until it's your heroes turn again?

[Elvin]

I doubt they stack,motw is not a spell.Sorcery helps after you have placed a mark

[Grumpy Old Wizard]

In version 1.3 and after they limit you to one MOTW but make it work with sorcery.

GOW

[okrane]

that means you can place your mark and change the target almost with no loss of initiative, especially when using Jhora

[Banedon]

I wonder how the strategic landscape has developed? Especially since I'm getting seriously into MultiPlayer against my brothers (who are both very competent players). Playing against the map we all have no problems and achieve formidable armies early, but once when assessing more difficult battles we do get clueless. Just yesterday I found out that First Aid Tents had shots (?! - been playing too much Heroes 3 I guess) and while we all know lots of theory putting them into practice has always been the crucial thing.

How has the strategic landscape developed? I noticed that among 16 players in the 速攻世界杯 only one played Sylvan (and indeed, the last time I tried Sylvan against my brothers' Academy + Dungeon, the Destructive Magic was annihilating - I learned the wrong skills; need Light Magic against casters) while Academy does appear to be increasingly used. I've also come to see MMR as the normal Academy strategy since Academy must rely on Magic - but then maybe not learning multiple magics, only one or at most two.

I dunno. What has changed?

[Elvin]

Not much.Just people realised that fast lvling with magic focus+artifacts from artifact merchants instead of dwellings works better.The death of traditional building all dwellings and exploration...Everything goes to rushing which while fun makes me long for the times where things went more slowly.

[PhoenixReborn]

In version 1.3 and after they limit you to one MOTW but make it work with sorcery.

GOW

Thanks GOW, that makes a lot of sense. I'm playing the wizard campaign and I was wondering why my ice bolt didn't work on two targets. I must have cast a second mark that didn't 'stick'.

[Elvin]

Afaik motw just costs half hero initiative irrespective of sorcery.

[Banedon]

Not much.Just people realised that fast lvling with magic focus+artifacts from artifact merchants instead of dwellings works better.The death of traditional building all dwellings and exploration...Everything goes to rushing which while fun makes me long for the times where things went more slowly.

Is there a thread you can direct me to?

[Elvin]

I thought you had read that It's in the link I gave in page 1,first post.I just gave the short version of it.
Unfortunately getting through all the disagreements there and disbelief posts,it's a bit hard to locate all the hints of how it's meant to be played.There are minor inconsistensies as well but this strategy is pretty adaptable so if you learn its principles and flaws you can make your own version of it.

[Banedon]

Well the last post in that topic was on December 6, which is some time ago and some things should have developed. That's why I asked. Thanks.

[Elvin]

Last I saw 86wyp he said that things were fine and academy still wins against the other factions Didn't mention new improvements but then again he should know all there is by the time he made the thread.They were working on it some time before posting their findings in HC.